Tekoah: Evacuation of Refugees in Gaza Area Undertaken with Safeguards

Yosef Tekoah, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, in a letter to Secretary General U Thant, stated that Israel’s evacuation and transfer of Arab refugees in the Gaza Strip has been undertaken with “all possible safeguards” to “avoid undue hardship to inhabitants of the houses affected.” In his letter, sent to Thant last Thursday afternoon, Tekoah stated: “No demolition takes place unless alternative housing, of at least equal standard, is provided to the occupants of the house. In most instances the new accommodations are of a higher standard.” Tekoah noted that the evacuations and transfers are aimed to assure the security and welfare of the Gaza area and its inhabitants. He stated that Egypt and other Arab states “have instigated and supported a campaign of indiscriminate terror in the Gaza area. The main victims of this campaign have been local Arab inhabitants.” Sine June 1967 Arab terror organizations have killed 219 Arab residents of the Gaza area, including 51 women and 29 children, and wounded 1,314 local Arab inhabitants, including 118 women and 239 children, Tekoah stated. “These acts are aimed at spreading violence and insecurity amidst the local Arab population so as to prevent improvement in its situation and to keep it in the condition of misery and congestion created during Egyptian occupation,” Tekoah declared.

He added that in the past four months, in seven separate attacks between April 12 and Aug. 16. Arab terrorists have killed nine Arabs, including five children, and wounded 135 other persons, including 25 youngsters. “Such murderous crimes cannot be tolerated,” Tekoah wrote to Thant. “It is Israel’s responsibility, as stipulated also in the Security Council Resolution 237 of June 14, 1967, to ensure the safety, welfare and security of all the inhabitants in areas under its control.” Tekoah, criticizing Egypt’s Foreign Minister Mahmoud Riad for his adverse comments on Israel’s efforts in the Gaza area, declared: “The world remembers how well the Egyptian authorities demolished hundreds of Gaza houses not for the purpose of peace and security, but in the name of war and bloodshed.”